I was born in 1969 in a little South African town called Nylstroom, which is named after the Nile River of Egypt.
I started my Police career on 15 December 1987 as Student Constable, which means I am in my 30th year as a Police Officer. I was promoted to Constable on 25 November 1988 after finishing Police training, ending up the second best student in the whole police college.
I have experience in Charge office duties, first responder on patrol vans, radio control (despatcher), Crime prevention, Detective, Shift Commander. I also was privileged to be acting Station Commander as well as Acting Unit Commander.
I was promoted to Sergeant in November 1994 and to Warrant Officer in July 1996.
In 2007 I was recruited by the Commander of the Forensic Services in Sasolburg. My career in Forensics kicked off. I went through ten weeks of the advanced crime scene course in 2007 after which I did fingerprint investigation as investigator only. The advanced course consisted of photography, videography, fingerprints, plan drawing, collecting, packaging and sending of forensic exhibits and processing of various crime scenes. I finished top of the class in this course.
I did my Forensic course in 2008 pertaining to the following activities: Biology, Chemistry, Ballistics, Primer Residue, Scientific Analysis, Questioned documents, Fire Scene Investigation, Forensic Engineering after which I started doing crime scene investigations.
Later on a very tough DNA Recovery course was introduced which I did twice because my first one was not on my record.
I completed the digital lifter scanner course for fingerprints in 2009.
I was privileged to have done two courses facilitated by world leaders in their fields. Firstly, a crimes scene reconstructing advanced course with Ross Gardner from USA, which also included bloodstain pattern analysis and secondly I attended a tyre and footwear course with Esther Neath from the United Kingdom.
In 2010 I was awarded Fingerprint Expert status by a panel of Experts and I also was awarded with Criminalistic Expert status, which means I was fully trained and passed all relevant courses to be able to handle any crime scene.
I completed a Spheron 360 degree camera course in 2011.
I attended a workshop on the use of alternative light sources on crime scenes and am using the light sources to great effect on scenes.
I also attended training in downloading CCTV footage for Image Analysis in 2016.
Last, but not least, I successfully passed a fingerprint proficiency test in 2016.
One of my high profile cases was reconstructed for television and I will be presenting that case to people from all over the world at an International conference that will be held in South Africa early this year.
I am a dedicated crime scene investigator with a great passion for the work. I am trying to get the SAPS to help me in becoming a Bloodstain Pattern Analyst. This is what I want to be. I am also hoping to be able to give back, so to speak, by giving training to newly appointed CSI’s in my last Five years before retirement.
In the meantime I am an active Crime Scene Investigator and loving my work.